Not Myself Sequel 4: To Live Again
by Saerry Snape
Summary: COMPLETE. A full one hundred one years after World Beyond, a new evil begins to ravage the wizarding world. And greatgreat grandchildren of Harry Snape have a plan of how to stop it. Of course, they may get killed in a process...and not by the evil.
1. Time Passes Like a Flash

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Harry Potter nor anything otherwise related. I do, however, make claim on NM Harry's personality as well as those of all the other canon characters and my original chars.

_Time passes like a flash._

_One minute it's there,_

_then gone in the aftermath._

_People you love die,_

_but their memory lives on;_

_Until it seems_

_that they live again._

_"Remembrance" by Anastasia Snape-Vickers, in memoriam of Severus Jardin Snape (2001-2156)_

**Chapter 1 **

**Time Passes Like a Flash**

"Are you certain you want to do this?"

Violet Vickers-Romaniv, great-great grandchild of Harry Snape and forty-six-year-old Hogwarts professor, lifted her head to look at her cousin from underneath her wild black hair. Her nimble hands ceased drawing a complicated pattern upon the floor of Ashdeir Fierion's entrance hall and she sat back on her heels, wiping chalk from her hands on her skirt.

"Yes," she replied, fixing her gray eyes on her cousin's face. "We need help, Adam. And he's the only person who can."

Adam Lakewood, her three years older cousin and Auror, ran a hand back through his auburn hair and shook his head.

"I don't like this, Vi. Doesn't seem…right."

Violet frowned and said, "It's not. But what other choice do we have?"

He sighed and muttered in reply, "None."

"Right." She then lifted her hand and extended the piece of chalk she'd been drawing with to him. "Finish it."

Adam took the piece of chalk gingerly and looked at it for a long moment before he strode over to the opposite side of the large circle she'd sketched out on the floor. It spanned three feet from its radius and had two other circles inside it, each at the exact spot where the other two feet hit. Obscure symbols and rune's littered the insides of the circles and as Adam knelt across from Violet, he drew the last one in.

He then set the chalk aside and looked across at his cousin, who had gone suddenly pale. She turned her head to look up towards the staircase and the second floor, which was where her husband and two children were sleeping. They – nor any others of the family – had any idea of what the two of them were doing on this night. The only soul that knew was Marly, the family house-elf, and Violet had sworn her to secrecy.

"Vi," he said softly.

Violet looked at him then her eyes hardened and she growled, "We're doing this."

Adam nodded and as one they both laid their hands palm down on top of symbols to their immediate left and right. A single symbol sat between their hands and made a direct line between the two of them across the circle.

Violet took a deep, shuddering breath to steady her nerves and began to speak.

"_Leth kaibaine maith desais ak ay toth, chall wyrr ii urgifphal maith Istveilain ryrmai!_"

Adam felt the words echo to something deep within him and he threw all of his doubts away. With the first words of the spell, they couldn't turn back now.

He repeated her words then spoke the next line as the spell worked by two people repeating the lines and strengthening the spell doubly. Whoever repeated, spoke the next line.

"_Leth wyrr ii ooka maith queraif Kaida aith leth bishel re san, leth xarra, leth ja labr praithee!_"

Between their hands, the symbols that made a line between them began to glow.

"_Leth wyrr tar chai yifpanee gif jarall kaidain!_" said Violet, her voice rising to a near shout.

All of the symbols within the circle blazed forth with a violent white light and they turned their faces away, closing their eyes. But Adam repeated the line and bellowed out the next without skipping a beat.

"_Leth wyrr Haraii Jifkai Snaran!_"

They shouted the last line as one voice as the power of the spell swept around them, the circle glowing violently between them.

"_Cha, esti kinai, wuril san kee!_"

A muffled explosion echoed through Ashdeir Fierion and Erik Romaniv, Violet's husband, was jolted out of a sound sleep. He sprang out of a bed empty but for himself and ran from the room down the hall to that of his children. Finding the twins still sleeping, he turned and headed for the entrance hall.

He was almost there when he heard a voice he didn't recognize bellow, "_Tar nurr yyet narr!_"

Half recognizing the language as the Elven he'd heard his wife and her family sometimes speak, he broke into a run down the corridors.

"VIOLET!" he shouted as he skidded, wide-eyed, to a stop at the top of the staircase. His hands clenched on the balcony railing at the sight beneath him in the entrance hall.

On one side Adam was hauling himself to his feet, a cut dripping blood down into his right eye and his left arm hanging by his side at an odd angle. Violet's form was crumpled on the other side of the room but her head slowly lifted and Erik released the breath he'd been holding.

"_Tar nurr yyet narr?_"

Erik's gaze shifted away from his wife and his jaw dropped at the figure that was in the center of the entrance hall, crouched in the center of a chalk circle. It was a figure he had only seen in a portrait and had never expected to see in real life.

Especially since he'd been dead for one hundred thirteen years!

Violet pushed herself up onto an elbow and smiled at the crouched, naked figure. She then twitched her fingers, causing a cloak to drift from its hook by the door and drop over his broad shoulders.

"Hello, Great-great Grandfather," she murmured, her gray eyes meeting his emerald for a split second before she fainted.

In the center of the chalk circle, Harold Jamison Snape pulled the heavy black cloak about himself and stared at the dark-haired woman on the floor in front of him. He then frowned and looked down at where his scarred hands clutched the cloak together then looked at the woman again.

His hand touched the floor and felt the graininess of the chalk alongside the coolness of the stone floor. Then he touched his thigh and felt warm, very much alive flesh and the bone underneath.

Sorrow, pain, and anger welled up within him and he screamed at the unfairness of the universe that had allowed him to be taken away from his Niamh.

In response, Ashdeir Fierion shook to its foundations as it realized the one who had rebuilt it and constructed its wards had returned.

Miles and miles away, Saul Weasley, Headmaster of Hogwarts and great grandchild of Ronald Weasley and Mischa Davids, sprang to his feet as the castle shuddered beneath him. He sank back into his chair as it ceased and wondered what had happened to cause the ancient castle to react so.

In the Forbidden Forest, a dark shape reared onto its hind legs, a crooked horn extending from it's forehead dimly reflecting what light filtered down from the moon. A fierce war cry echoing through the forest caused even the acromantula's to pause and the centaur's to look instantly to the sky. As they realized that a star long gone out had reappeared brighter than ever, the last Darcorn's iron hooves pounded relentlessly at the ground as he sped away to greet one he'd sworn to protect.

And in an alternate plane altogether, an aging queen jolted out of a sound sleep. Her husband shifted beside her and pushed himself up onto one elbow, frowning at her from underneath his gray hair.

"Sheen? What's wrong?"

Sheen Ardwith, Queen of the Elves, turned wide eyes to her husband's face and replied, "He's alive.

"Harry is alive."

**Elven Translations**

_Violet and Adam's spell:_

Give life from death at my command, bring back a soul from heavenly demesne!

Give back a body from hallowed ground and give breath to it, give blood, give all that abounds!

Give back what was taken upon these grounds!

Give back Harold Jamison Snape!

We, his kin, demand it now!

_Tar nurr yyet narr: _What have you done

**Author's Note**

Everyone gets the title now, I hope?


	2. Gone in the Aftermath

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Harry Potter nor anything otherwise related. I do, however, make claim on NM Harry's personality as well as those of all the other canon characters and my original chars.

_Time passes like a flash._

_One minute it's there,_

_then gone in the aftermath._

_People you love die,_

_but their memory lives on;_

_Until it seems_

_that they live again._

_"Remembrance" by Anastasia Snape-Vickers, in memoriam of Severus Jardin Snape (2001-2156)_

**Chapter 2 **

**Gone in the Aftermath**

"Why did you bring me back?"

Violet looked up into her great-great grandfather's emerald eyes then quickly looked away.

"We need your help."

Harry narrowed his eyes and spat, "With _what_? A blood feud? Teaching you how to duel?"

Adam shook his head and replied, "To survive."

Emerald eyes blinked in surprise at that and Harry looked between his two descendants.

"A Dark Wizard?"

"He's calling himself the Dark Lord," explained Violet. "We don't know his real name but he's been devastating our world for four years now."

"The Auror's can't stand against him. His men, maybe, but not him," added Adam.

Harry scowled and looked up at Erik, snarling, "And who are you?"

The Russian wizard blinked then replied, "Violet's husband. Erik Romaniv."

"I see." He leaned back in his chair in the kitchen and scowled at the top of the table for a moment. "And what year is this?"

"2163," offered Adam.

"So I've been dead for over a hundred years."

"A hundred thirteen to be exact," said Erik. He then shook his head and added, "You look exactly like your portrait."

Harry frowned and growled, "I don't doubt it since Hermione painted it." He then looked at Adam and Violet and asked, "And how many more of you are there? I can't remember much now from when I was dead but I do remember that my son had three children after I died."

"I'm Anastasia's granddaughter," said Violet. "And Adam here is Ulric's."

"I have a twin named Arthur, as well," added Adam.

Harry nodded then asked, "And does the Snape name still exist?"

Both of them nodded in response and Violet replied, "Great-uncle Morgan's line carries the name. There have been son's for three generations now in his."

"Good. The name still lives. Who is the Head of the Line?"

"My father Jacob technically is," said Violet. "But since Cousin Patrick is the eldest living with the Snape name he has the title."

"He's not the eldest living Snape, cousin," murmured Adam.

Harry frowned at him and asked, "What do you mean?"

Adam opened his mouth to answer but didn't get a chance as from the door came a shocked gasp.

"Dear sweet mother of Merlin…"

Harry spun in his chair and gasped, "_Uncle Eti!_"

Etienne Daladier, now just a hair over the age of two hundred, stared blankly at his half-nephew.

"_H-Harry?_"

He then looked at Violet and Adam and snarled, "You two! _You actually performed the spell?_"

"What other choice did we have?" cried Violet. "We _need_ him!"

"You had no need to pull him from the afterlife, foolish girl!" Etienne then took a nervous step towards his nephew and began, "Harry, lad, I…"

His voice was cut off as a suddenly upright Harry unexpectedly tugged him into a bear hug. The cloak wrapped about the ex-dead man slipped slightly and Etienne caught it, tugging it back into place.

"I'm glad you're still alive, old man," whispered Harry feverishly into his half-uncle's ear. "All of this is getting to me."

"I'm not certain whether to be happy you're alive or to beat your great-great grandchildren over my knee for bringing you back," growled Etienne, pulling back to look into the emerald eyes.

Harry chuckled and said, "We'll kill them later. Right now I want to ask you to do something, Uncle."

"What?"

"Catch me."

"Wha…_Harry!_"

Etienne barely caught the descending weight of his nephew and tugged his suddenly slack body against his chest, which was an awkward position as the younger man was a good seven inches taller than him now since he'd shrunk slightly with age.

"Adam, Erik, give an old man a hand, would you?"

His snapped words caused the two younger men to spring into action and they took Harry from him, bundling him into the cloak as they eased him back into his chair.

"Are you really mad at us, Uncle?" asked Violet meekly. "Would you not have brought him back if you knew how?"

Etienne looked at her for a long moment then at the unconscious face of his nephew. Even after more than a hundred years dead, he still looked like he was struggling with something in his sleep.

"You don't truly know what he went through, child," he said softly. "Not even me telling you can give you the slightest idea. To bring him back from where he was…it was one of the worst things you could have done."

Tears gathered in Violet's eyes at his words and he brushed them away, shaking his head.

"Don't cry, child. You did what you thought was right and I cannot fault you for that. I did the same once. Because of that, we'll speak no more of this." He looked towards Harry's unconscious form and continued, "Now we'll just figure out where to go from here. Alright?"

"M'kay," murmured Violet, reminding Etienne of when she was six and he's scolded her. Then he'd given her a piece of candy despite her mother's rule of "No Candy Before Dinner" and sent her on her way with a promise to wait till after dinner to eat it.

Etienne nodded then turned towards Adam and Erik, saying, "Let's get him upstairs. Violet, you know where the old clothes and such are stored, don't you?"

"Yes, Uncle. Sam and I got into Great Grandmother Janella's things once. Aunt Rebecca scolded us horribly for it."

"Good. Go and find a trunk with the initials 'HJP' on the lock."

Violet frowned and asked, "Shouldn't it be 'HJS,' Uncle?"

Etienne shook his silver head and smiled slightly.

"Harry never changed the final initial on his trunk even after everyone found out he was a Snape. The war with Voldemort took up most of the time then and after that he was out of school so I suppose he never saw a point. Now move, girl."

She nodded and left the kitchen, leaving the three men to frown at Harry's unconscious form. Erik then looked at Adam and asked, "You want the head or the feet?"

"I'll take the head," replied Adam. "I'm stronger than you and he's mostly muscle."

"Ow, my man feelings."

"Shut up and get his feet, prat."

Etienne shook his head at the two men's banter – which they'd done since Violet had married the Russian – and led the way upstairs to one of the spare bedrooms. After they'd settled Harry on the bed and the younger men had left the room, Violet appeared with a bundle of clothes that consisted of dark pants and a faded green shirt that Etienne recognized. It was the shirt that Ginny had made for Harry and Niamh with their school nicknames on them.

He took the clothes from her and set them on the bedside table where Harry would see them when he awoke before he ushered Violet out. Then he tugged the blankets up over his nephew, drawing the cloak carefully out from under him once he was covered up.

"Forgive them," he whispered to his nephew as he pulled a sheet over his scarred chest. "They only know you as a warrior and a powerful wizard. Not as I do."

He then slowly left the room, murmuring to the spirits that he knew lingered about the Snape family, "And forgive your great-great grandchildren for taking him from you, Niamh."

_They could have asked first_, he heard the fiery woman growl faintly.

He allowed himself a chuckle at that then retreated to his rooms to wonder what he was going to do with a suddenly alive nephew.

**Author's Note**

Yep, Etienne's still alive. It's cause I like him. Have since I wrote his entrance to Ashdeir Fierion in _Brother Mine_. He was such a cute, nervous kiddy. _cuddles little Eti_

And, yes, to anyone that has played Knights of the Old Republic I, one of Erik's comments is a blatant reference.


	3. People You Love Die

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Harry Potter nor anything otherwise related. I do, however, make claim on NM Harry's personality as well as those of all the other canon characters and my original chars.

_Time passes like a flash._

_One minute it's there,_

_then gone in the aftermath._

_People you love die,_

_but their memory lives on;_

_Until it seems_

_that they live again._

_"Remembrance" by Anastasia Snape-Vickers, in memoriam of Severus Jardin Snape (2001-2156)_

**Chapter 3 **

**People You Love Die**

Erik was walking towards the kitchen when he heard a muffled curse from above him and looked up to see Harry coming down the stairs, his face black was rage. He instinctively shrank back from the man but managed to find the will to ask him a question.

"Something wrong?"

Harry paused at the bottom of the stairs and looked across the entrance hall at him. His emerald eyes seemed to flicker at the edges with dark shadows…or perhaps that was just a trick of the light.

"Everything is wrong," he growled in response before he turned to the right and stormed down to the main study. Erik watched him pause at the door then he grasped the doorknob and turned it, entering quickly. The door slammed shut behind him and the Russian wizard was certain he heard a faint scream of rage and sorrow come from within the room.

Continuing on his path to the kitchen, he wondered aloud, "Just what have you brought back, my love?"

- - -

"So let me get this straight," growled Harry, steepling his fingers and glaring at Violet over them. "You dragged me out of death so I could fight for you?"

"Yes," replied Violet, lifting her chin bravely.

Beside her, Adam said, "He is insanely powerful. There hasn't even been anyone recorded with that much power since your time!"

Harry frowned at that. Then he asked, "There were only three powerful wizards during my lifetime: myself, Voldemort, and Albus Dumbledore. Which of the three are you comparing this…" he paused to sneer in contempt "…_Dark Lord_ to?"

Adam looked at his cousin then back at Harry before he replied.

"I-I'm not certain. The only one we really know of is you. Any information on Dumbledore or Voldemort has been mostly forgotten by the masses. Some of them don't even remember either of the wars during your time."

"I see," said Harry. He then looked at his half-uncle and added, "Does _anyone_ in this time beside the family know the specifics of Voldemort's death?"

Etienne shook his head sadly at that.

"Alas, only the family really remembers. Your father's sacrifice was deemed a small part by the history books and was left out. As was Jardin's. Most hardly even know you nearly died on that field."

Harry cursed foully in Elven, absently touching his chest over his heart where Ardwynhén herself had nearly killed him. Jardin had given his life for him and his father had kept him from almost dying a second time! How _dare_ history brush them aside as though they were _nothing!_

"Damn the history books," he growled, slamming a fist down on his old desk. He then locked eyes with Adam and snarled out, "What do you know of this Dark Lord of yours?"

"He was a following of nearly three hundred – maybe more – as far as we can tell." The younger man shook his head and continued, "We can't even field that many Auror's any more. Too many have died in the field and after that, no one's wanted to join up. We've had at least forty men and women leave our ranks in the past year alone!"

"Humphf. Figures. Only a handful of Auror's, even in these times, will stand against the Darkness."

Harry barked out a harsh laugh at his own words and shook his heads.

"I see that some things never change. Now…tell me, why should I fight this Dark Lord for you?"

Violet and Adam both stared in him in shock, leaving Erik to say something. He spun away from where he'd stood staring into the fire blazing on the hearth to shout, "_Why?_ Because otherwise he'll destroy us all!"

Harry frowned and said, "Everything seems fine here."

"You built these wards strong, Harry," said Etienne. "I think even Merlin would be hard pressed to get through them, even after all these years." He then paused and added, "But the Dark Lord hasn't been striking at families. He's been hitting the more public places."

"Diagon Alley?" said Harry. "How? Hell, Uncle, I built _these_ wards after getting a glimpse at the spells for the one's used to safeguard _it_!"

Etienne shook his silver head and said, "Those wards lack one specific thing that you built into the one's here: a focus. You cast the wards then linked all of them to those crystals, remember? The one's that are buried at the edges of the property and around the house?"

"Vaguely. It's hard to remember everything from when I was alive. And Ni was really the one to think up that idea, not me." He smiled wistfully and murmured, "She was a brilliant woman."

"Yes, she was."

Harry sat in silence for a moment then looked at Adam and said stonily, "Take me somewhere he's struck. I want to see the damage with my own eyes. Then we'll decide if I'm going to help you."

"And if you don't?" asked Violet, looking worriedly up at him as he stood. He stared right back at her, knowing that the only reason she had really brought him back was fear for her children and family. That he could understand all too well.

But he'd never allowed anyone to fight his battles for him.

He stared stonily at her for a moment then said gruffly, "I committed suicide once. I can damn well do it again."

With that, he swept out of the room, leaving Adam no other choice but to follow him. After they had gone, Erik looked at Etienne and asked, "Would he really?"

The old wizard nodded in response and whispered, "Yes."

"Then I hope he finds something to change his mind," said Erik, looking at his wife, who stared back worriedly at him. "Or else we won't have much of a world to raise our children in."

- - -

Adam and Harry walked gingerly down the main street of what had been Hogsmeade village a mere two weeks before. The Dark Lord's forces had swept down upon it in the middle of the night and had razed it to the ground.

Not a soul who lived within had been spared.

Harry's fists clenched as he looked around at the destruction, flashbacks of the same sort of chaos he'd seen years ago during Voldemort's reign zipping through his mind. He took a step forward and felt his foot hit something. Looking down, he saw a miraculously intact bottle of butterbeer laying on its side an inch or so from his toes.

Crouching, he picked up the bottle and looked at it for a moment before he stood. Adam stared incredulously at him as he jerked out the cork and downed half the bottle in one go.

Harry allowed himself a small smile as he murmured, "Still as good as I remember." He then looked at the collapsed, burnt-out buildings around him, remembering the last time he'd seen the village. It had been so busy, so bustling with life then…now it was nothing more than a ghost town.

Turning, he looked up at the distant spires of Hogwarts and sighed.

"Damnit," he muttered before downing the rest of the butterbeer. He hurled the bottle into the remnants of the Three Broomsticks then, watching it shatter against the remains of the fireplace mantle.

Turning his head slightly towards Adam, he asked, "A night attack, was it?"

The Auror looked up in surprise from inspecting a section of untouched grass amidst the burnt that had likely borne a body at some point in time to respond, "Yes." He looked at the shattered buildings and continued, "They had no warning at all…"

Harry frowned at that and muttered, "It's the war all over again."

"What?"

"Nothing."

Adam looked at him oddly and Harry turned away, mentally brushing back the memories of the long ago war that he'd lost Niamh at the beginning of. He then sighed and looked up at the cloudy, gray sky, muttering, "I'm going to regret this, aren't I?"

_Regret helping our family?_

"We took care of our own problems," whispered Harry, feeling reassured by Niamh's voice. He'd felt her presence nearby for the past ten minutes and had taken comfort from it. "Why do they need me to take care of theirs?"

He almost saw her frown then and the darkening of her blue eyes.

Times now are not like ours were, my love, she said. Help them. 

"And if it takes a year?"

_Then it takes a year. We are here waiting for you, Harry, and we won't leave. Help our family survive._

He sighed, shoulders slumping slightly as he heard her words. Then he looked towards his right shoulder where her presence hovered and said, "I don't like this."

_But you'll do it._

"Have I ever let you down, Ni?"

He saw her smile in his mind's eye – that brilliant smile he'd kill to see in the flesh one last time – and heard her chuckle softly.

_Never, my love. Now go and reassure our poor great-great grandchild before he dies of stress._

Harry smiled and muttered, "Yes, ma'am."

As he turned to walk back towards Adam – he'd wandered away to look at the buildings at some point in time – he heard Niamh mutter, _Chauvinist pig._

"Wench," hissed Harry back before he squared his shoulders and went to do what he'd never wanted to do again.

He went to begin the waging of a war.


	4. Memory Lives On

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Harry Potter nor anything otherwise related. I do, however, make claim on NM Harry's personality as well as those of all the other canon characters and my original chars.

_Time passes like a flash._

_One minute it's there,_

_then gone in the aftermath._

_People you love die,_

_but their memory lives on;_

_Until it seems_

_that they live again._

_"Remembrance" by Anastasia Snape-Vickers, in memoriam of Severus Jardin Snape (2001-2156)_

**Chapter 4 **

**Memory Lives On**

"Sir?"

"What is it?"

"Another letter, sir."

Harry looked up and eyed the letter in his self-proclaimed assistant's hand.

"Another death threat," he growled. "Toss it."

"Y-yes, sir!"

He watched the young woman – barely in her teenage years and with the barest minimum of schooling thanks to the war – scamper out of the room. Leaning back in his chair, he ran a hand through his hair and grumbled something rather unsavory in Elven that Niamh would have slapped him for saying if she could have understood it.

It had been two years since his great-great granddaughter Violet Romaniv had brought him back from the dead. During that interval both she and her son, Lucas, had been lost in an explosion near Hogwarts just before the castle had fallen. Her husband Erik had sought out the culprits despite Harry's warnings and had ended up dead because of it. Which left ten-year-old Anna Romaniv to grow up under the care of her aging great-great-great-great uncle and ex-dead great-great-great grandfather.

The now twelve-year-old girl was one of their best Healer's, a talent that had been discovered just before her parents had died. She'd originally wanted to join the assassins and hunt down the killers of her family but Harry had swiftly (and viciously) stopped that in its tracks. He'd agreed to teach her and had despite her great-uncle Aleksandr and Etienne's wishes.

It was him pushing her to her limits that brought her back from plunging into the depths of madness. After that, she'd sworn she'd never pick up a weapon again. Instead she heightened her skills in healing and she had such innate skill in the field that she could work her magic without a wand.

Then again, she had _learnt_ it that way as she considered a wand a weapon as well.

Harry couldn't blame her for not waiting to touch a weapon again. If he could help it, he'd never touch one again himself.

Three other losses had been suffered within the family as well. Draco's great-great granddaughter through his granddaughter Durundia – Hermione Nostra – had been killed just a few weeks before. And nearly a year ago Benjamin Longbottom, Harry's great-grandchild, had been killed along with Adam's twin brother Arthur in a failed raid on one of the Dark Lord's fortresses.

The recent birth of Cadian Malfoy had lifted their spirits, however, and hope for an end to the war was brighter than ever.

And yet Harry could have had it over with long ago if he could just corner the so-called Dark Lord long enough to get a good fight out of him.

But it seemed this new Dark Lord had learned a few things since Voldemort's time.

Shaking his head, he rose from his desk and walked out of the study in Ashdeir Fierion that had become his again. Ever since Diagon Alley had been overrun and their original base at the Ministry of Magic had been compromised a year and a half ago, the Snape estate had become their base. The main reason were the extensive wards that only Harry and Etienne knew how to truly destroy and the second was that they could house their entire force there with every room in the house and cottage occupied and a few tents scattered about the front lawn.

The Malfoy's Downs and Rook's Wood – the old Parkinson estate that had become a Malfoy property without Harry's knowledge or Malfoy money buying it – were two of their other bases but as their wards weren't as strong as those surrounding Ashdeir Fierion, few of their forces were ever there. Mainly the spy's and assassins stayed in those two locations, taking their chances with the weaker wards that others dared not.

Wandering into the kitchen, he returned Adam's greeting with a grunt and moved over to snatch a piece of toast off the stack that Marly had set up on the counter. As he took a bite and chewed it, he felt a dim zap on his arm and looked down at the little elf.

"Master Harry must wait until Marly is done before he eats!"

He smiled at the house-elf, who was truly starting to get up in years as house-elves go, and said, "Don't have time. I'm supposed to be meeting Saul in twelve minutes to discuss something he thinks rather important."

Marly frowned and waved a long-handled spoon at him, snapping, "That is no excuse, Master Harry!" She then smiled and said in a gentler tone, "But Marly will let you get away with it."

Harry bowed to the elf, making a flourish with his toast-encumbered hand.

"Thank you, Marly, my dear. You're an angel."

The house-elf harrumphed at that and turned back to fixing breakfast for the nearly two hundred bodies that would soon be up and about. Harry turned away and nodded at Adam as he left the kitchen, nearly running over one of the younger children as he did so.

"Watch yourself, William!"

"Yes, sir!" cried the ten-year-old, snapping off a salute before he ran into the kitchen. Harry saw him grab a piece of toast as he dashed past Marly before the door closed and laughed when he heard the elf begin to scold the boy through the door.

Munching happily on his piece of toast, he wandered out onto the grounds, starting to make the daily rounds he'd begun when their forces had set up on the estate. A few early risers greeted him as he weaved through the tents scattered across the lawn and he nodded back. As he left the area where they were set up, he made a left turn and strode down a nearly hidden path between some trees that would lead him down to the cemetery.

He'd once asked Victoria why it was hidden and she had replied that after Patrick Snape's wife Melissa had died and been buried, he had had the trees and bushes planted so he would not be able to see her grave from the house. In the years after, they had done their job well and now only the family and those that stumbled upon it knew of its existence.

Stepping into the cemetery, Harry slowly ambled through it, reading each gravestone with care as he did so. When he had still been alive, there had only been three graves: his father's, Niamh's, and the joint one that housed the bodies of Jardin and Hedwig. Now those of his son, daughter, their spouse's, and a handful of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren had joined them.

Halting at the base of Jardin's and Hedwig's tomb, he bent and picked up five blades of grass. A snap of his fingers and a whispered spell caused the blades to transfigure themselves into five roses.

Carefully, he placed one on the graves of the four people and two creatures he'd held closest to his heart. Niamh's he went to last and he sank to one knee beside the stark white marble tombstone that sheltered her body.

"Where are you, love?" he whispered as he laid the rose atop her tombstone. His fingers slid down to trace the worn lines of her name as he added, "It's been almost a year since you spoke to me."

And indeed it had. Almost a year had passed since he had felt the nearly constant presence of his deceased wife hovering over him, her words whispered gently into his ear in encouragement. She was the only reason he was still fighting this twice-damned war.

And now she wasn't there.

The fact that she had vanished with no warning disturbed him. And he had no way to know if she had been brought back as he had or the connections between the spirit world and the living had drug far enough apart that they could no longer speak. Of everyone on the other side, she'd always had the easiest time contacting him – his father he'd heard from a total of six times and Saerry and Severus had only managed to get through once.

Movement from behind him made his hand snap to the Elven dagger strapped at his hip and he rose into a crouch, eyes darting between the shadows that surrounded him. Leaves and branches snapped to his immediate right and he whipped out the dagger at the same instant a horrified looking Saul Weasley burst through.

"Harry!"

"Good Merlin, man," muttered Harry as he sheathed the dagger. "I nearly killed you!"

"No matter," gasped Saul, causing the dark wizard to arch an eyebrow. "One of our spies just reported that the Dark Lord's forces are gathering for a full-scale assault."

"Here?"

"Here."

Harry cursed vehemently in Elven then turned burning eyes to Saul.

"What was it you wanted to talk to me about?"

The Weasley's face fell and he shook his head, saying, "I'd hoped that my sources were wrong and I wouldn't have to tell you this."

Harry scowled and Saul gasped out, "The Dark Lord brought a soul back into this world months ago and trapped it within a crystal ball. He apparently keeps it stored somewhere within his body – we're not sure how – except when he's within his rooms."

"And?"

"One of the spies got a good look at it. And they could see the spirit inside."

Harry arched an eyebrow again, waiting for him to finish.

"And?" he repeated, making a whirling motion with his hand.

Saul looked at him sadly and replied, "It's Niamh, Harry. The spy put the memory in a Pensieve and had Etienne view it. He's positive it was her."

There was a moment of tense silence in the cemetery then the hairs on the back of Saul's neck stood up as the air seemed to vibrate around them. A glance at Harry's eyes made him step back in sudden fear.

The whole of his eyes blazed black with rage and Harry snarled, "He will pay." He spun back towards Niamh's tombstone and continued, "I swear, Ni, that bastard will _pay_ for what he's done to you."

Spinning back towards Saul, he snapped, "Go to the house and rouse everyone. I want the tents up in ten minutes and everyone in full battle gear in an hour. Have Adam call the Downs and Rook's Wood and tell everyone there to get back here ASAP."

He then smiled ferally, teeth flashing as they made a slight shift into fangs.

"If he wants a fight," growled Harry, slapping a balled up fist into the palm of his other hand, "we'll give him a fight."

"And he will regret the day he heard the name _Snape!_"


	5. Live Again

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Harry Potter nor anything otherwise related. I do, however, make claim on NM Harry's personality as well as those of all the other canon characters and my original chars.

_Time passes like a flash._

_One minute it's there,_

_then gone in the aftermath._

_People you love die,_

_but their memory lives on;_

_Until it seems_

_that they live again._

_"Remembrance" by Anastasia Snape-Vickers, in memoriam of Severus Jardin Snape (2001-2156)_

**Chapter 5 **

**Live Again**

"So we meet again."

"Indeed," growled Harry as he and the Dark Lord circled one another. Around them, Dark Wizards and those members of the resistance fought and died but they paid no heed to them. All they cared about was each other.

The Dark Lord smirked beneath a mask he wore and said, "I've been wanting to have an all-out battle with you ever since I heard the rumors that you'd returned. You were the most powerful wizard in your generation, you know."

Harry just glowered at the man and growled, "Then let's fight. And without any of your lackey's getting in the way or you running this time."

"Are you certain you want to fight when I hold the soul of your beloved somewhere within my body?" sneered the Dark Lord. He flicked his wrist to snap his wand into his hand as he added, "If I die, her soul will cease to exist."

Part of Harry cried out in bloodthirsty rage at that and he barely held himself back from leaping at the Dark Lord. His entire body quivered with the urge to bridge the gap between them and he wanted nothing more then than to rip out the man's throat.

The Dark Lord smirked and whispered, "You want to kill me, don't you?"

Harry sneered at that.

"A lot of people want to kill you. But I get the honor."

"Humphf. A bit arrogant, aren't we?"

"Not arrogant," replied Harry with a smirk. He reached back behind his shoulder and drew Ardwynhén from her sheath, the old wound she'd made aching slightly. The blade flared to life and he leveled it at the Dark Lord, glaring at him through the emerald flames.

"I really am going to enjoy killing you."

The easy stance the Dark Lord had been maintaining faded and he flicked his wand sharply. Fire erupted around it and he twirled the sword the flames had formed into around his wand before pointing it at Harry.

"Let us dance then, Lord Snape."

Harry smirked and purred, "S'what I've been wanting all along." He then charged at the Dark Lord, Ardwynhén ringing out her cry for blood as he swung her to impact the fire sword.

The two fires blazed around each other as the real blade and the false one struck each other. Orange and emerald light lit the scarred face of Harry on one side, his black-flooded eyes practically reflecting it, and the masked visage of the Dark Lord on the other side. Blue eyes glinted from behind the mask before the two men shoved themselves away from each other.

The Dark Lord's sword flashed and he shouted out a spell in a language Harry didn't recognize. A golden circlet of light appeared at the end of his wand, which looked very odd as that placed the disc in the center of the swords 'blade'. Moments later it whirred and shot into the air, making a direct line towards Harry.

He sidestepped the circlet then spun as it came back around, this time using Ardwynhén to deflect it. It whirred angrily away then came back like an angry hornet. But Harry was ready for it.

He stepped backwards, narrowly avoiding a Petrificus Totalus at the same time, and used Ardwynhén like a baseball bat. The spinning circlet shot towards the Dark Lord and dissipated as he waved his wand-sword at it.

"Impressive," commented the Dark Lord before he aimed another unknown spell at Harry, followed swiftly by a Cruciatus Curse.

Harry threw up a shield with a thought then fell to one knee as the Cruciatus struck him. Using Ardwynhén like a crutch to regain his feet, he growled, "Not yet."

The masked man snorted and leapt forward, wand-sword flashing. It clashed with Ardwynhén again and the Snape heirloom hummed angrily in response, it's emerald flames licking at the orange one's. Harry then stopped pushing back against the wand-sword and fell onto his back. As he did this, his right foot lashed out and slammed heel-first into the Dark Lord's knee. Cartilage crunched in response and he went down with a dismayed cry.

Harry rolled to his feet and switched Ardwynhén to his left hand as he pulled back his right arm. His sleeve shifted slightly and the Elven runes on his forearm glowed momentarily before fire blazed forth at his command. It surrounded his arm and hand as a flaming gauntlet for a brief moment and he grinned menacingly down at the Dark Lord, who scrambled backwards in surprise.

"What in Merlin's name!"

"Oh," said Harry, all-black eyes glinting. "Was this never mentioned in the accounts? Stupid historians. Always getting things _wrong!_"

On the last word he lunged forward with his right hand outstretched, a feral snarl twisting his lips. The Dark Lord's sword whipped up and he grabbed it in his hand, the flames of both combining briefly before those Harry had created overwhelmed the wand-sword. His flames swept down the length of the sword and consumed the Dark Lord's wand before spreading to his robes and cloak.

The man staggered back, shouting out water spells as he beat at the flames. Harry smirked and shook his head before he stretched out his flaming hand and _twisted_. The flames consuming the Dark Lord's robes blazed hotter and the man collapsed in a screaming heap.

Harry smirked and took a few steps forward, looming over the writhing heap of flames.

"And here I thought this would be a difficult fight. Now…"

He bent down and thrust his right arm into the flames, his hand grasping the now severely burnt throat of the Dark Lord. The mask had been melded into his face because of the heat of the flames and the Dark Lord screamed in pain as Harry jerked him up onto his knees.

"…where is my wife's soul?" growled Harry. "Tell me where it is and I may just consider giving you a pleasant death."

The masked man continued to scream and Harry sighed before allowing the flames to fade away except for a few lines that flickered along the edge of the robes. His hand and forearm continued to blaze but did not burn the Dark Lord's already scorched body.

"Now speak."

Pain-filled and half-crazed blue eyes looked up into black and the Dark Lord hissed through what remained of his mask, "Go to Hell, you monster."

"You first," snarled Harry even as he felt a dagger hidden on the masked man's person slide into his stomach. It cut through his flesh easily because of the heated metal of the blade and bits of the blade sloughed off as it entered his body. As pain flooded his senses, Harry let fire consume the Dark Lord again.

He then tossed Ardwynhén aside, the flames around her blade winking off as she landed point first in the ground some seven feet away. Then he shouted a spell he remembered creating with Niamh so long ago and thrust his left hand into the Dark Lord's chest, his fingers latching onto the small sphere he found near the man's heart. Pulling his hand back out, he looked at the sphere for a moment, the face inside looking sadly at him as he stared at it.

"I'll see you soon," he whispered. Then he clenched his fist about the sphere and snarled something in Elven, the words harsh and strange because of his pain.

The sphere shattered with a sound like a cannon going off and anyone still living on the battlefield looked up as a white light exploded from within.

Niamh's soul burst free from the sphere's confines and Harry smiled before he tilted his head back, eyes sliding closed.

"HARRY!" shouted a bloodstained Adam as the flames that had enveloped the Dark Lord swept in a circle around the dark wizard and the corpse. It then rose up in a wall before anyone could get past it and he saw Harry within it for a brief moment before the fire gushed inward and enveloped his body.

What surprised anyone on the field was that he never even screamed as he died his third – and final – death.

- - -

"We should've stopped him," mumbled Adam as he, Anna, Jonathan Snape, his cousin Samuel, and Kai Longbottom gathered solemnly around Harry's body. All traces of the Dark Lord's were gone with the exception of a curled up piece of metal that they could only assume was his mask. "There had to've been some way…"

"I c-could've s-s-saved him," sniffed Anna. She then wiped her eyes with her sleeve and shook her head, muttering, "H-he didn't w-w-want me to c-cry over him."

Samuel looked down at her then wrapped an arm about her thin shoulders, tugging the young Healer against his side. She clung to him then and turned her face to sob quietly into his side. After her parents and twin's deaths, Harry had practically become a second father to her and to lose him after so little time was a crushing blow.

"He didn't want to be saved," muttered Kai. He then saw Ardwynhén in the ground nearby and nudged a solemn looking Jonathan in the ribs. The brown-haired man looked up to glare at him then followed his cousin's finger as he pointed out the sword.

Adam noticed as well and looked at the sword for a long moment before he said, "It's yours by right, John. What with you being the Snape Heir and all."

Jonathan frowned then walked slowly over to the sword, gingerly reaching out a hand towards its hilt. The emerald cat's-eye flashed briefly then the blade blazed to life as he jerked the sword out of the earth. He looked at it briefly then at Harry's corpse, blue eyes filling with sad shadows.

"What do we do now?" he asked. "With his body? I mean, we can't really bury it again, can we?"

"No," said a voice from behind him and they all turned to find Etienne limping towards them. He looked down at the body of his half-nephew for a long moment before he whistled sharply.

The Darcorn appeared out of thin air, causing everyone but Etienne to jump. Anna was the first to make a move towards the creature and earned a gentle nibble of her fingers because of it.

"He will take the body," said Etienne, gesturing at the Darcorn. "History only needs one body."

"Where will he take it?" asked Adam as the silver-haired wizard lifted the blackened corpse off the ground and onto the Darcorn's back. Etienne patted the unicorn's shoulder before he replied and murmured, "Be gentle, old friend."

The Darcorn nudged the old wizard with his head in response then turned and trotted into a glowing archway that appeared and disappeared in a matter of moments. Etienne then turned and answered Adam's question.

"To the Elven plane. There the Tethdaìr will give him what he deserved by their standards."

"And what's that?" asked Kai.

Etienne smiled and replied, "A warrior's funeral, my boy."

"Oh."

They stood in silence for a few moments then Anna mumbled, "What do we do now?"

Samuel looked down at her then at Etienne, Adam, Kai, and Jonathan in turn. His gaze lingered longest on the last, through whom the Snape Line would hopefully grow and flourish on into the ages after them.

He then smiled and said, "We live, Anna. We live."

**Author's Note**

And there is the end of the Not Myself saga's sequels. Stay tuned for the AU's and such!


End file.
